Down at the Dojo
by HoldOnToYourTunaCans
Summary: Ichigo and Tatsuki are sparring buddies at the dojo. Started as a cute little oneshot but thanks to a fan request turned into three chapters. Third chapter on hiatus. My apologies.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach or the characters

Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach or the characters. That privilege goes to Tite Kubo.

Five o'clock. Ichigo was at the dojo just like every day. Tatsuki had just beaten him. Again. The red-headed four year old was sitting in front of the short haired girl with her hand outstretched, offering to help him up. His face was red with embarrassment. How had she beaten him again? That had been the shortest fight yet!

He got up without taking her hand in his own indignant pride. He didn't need to be helped up by a girl he'd just lost to multiple times. He went to sit down on a bench outside to wait for his mom. It was nearly five, which meant class was over. As he pouted and swung his feet angrily, Ichigo saw Tatsuki's mom walking toward him. He watched as she went into the building and brought her daughter out a second later.

"Bye Ichigo!" Tatsuki called as she smiled and waved at him. He waved back at his victor unhappily as he watched her go. Why'd she always have to win? Was she just better than him?

Finally he looked up and saw his mom coming. "Mo-o-om, it took you foooreverrrr!" he whined.

"Sweety it's only been five minutes. It's not that long."

"It felt like a million years!" She laughed at her son's impatience and took his hand before crossing the street.

"Mommy, Tatsuki won _again_. It's not fair. She always wins. No matter how hard I try, she always beats me!"

"It's ok honey, you'll get her next time, I promise. You just gotta keep trying." The four-year-old Ichigo gave an audible sigh. He'd never beat her.

# # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # #

Here he was again, in her clutches. She was going to win again. '_You'll get her next time, I promise_' echoed through his mind. He threw a really good punch and then a kick. About two minutes later Tatsuki was on the ground faking a pout, Ichigo in front of her beaming and holding out his hand. She took it and said in a defeated tone, "Good match."

"Thanks."

"Wanna fight again?" she challenged.

"Sure," he accepted.

"You won't win this time," she said.

"We'll see about that," he answered.

Sure enough, about three minutes later Ichigo had lost again. He was annoyed. How had he lost again? He'd just beaten her! He took her outstretched hand and they sparred again, Tatsuki the winner.

When class was over Ichigo was sitting on the bench outside again. Tatsuki looked over and decided to join him. "What are you so happy about?" she asked.

"I beat you today!" he smiled.

"Yeah, but I won all the other times."

"You win every day."

"That's because you don't practice enough," she said.

She turned her head suddenly to look at Ichigo. "What?" he said.

She answered, "Oh nothin', your hair's just messed up is all."

"Hey look it's your mom," Ichigo observed.

"Oh yeah, it is." She turned to look back at the small red-headed boy sitting next to her. He was suddenly aware that his sparring buddy was now very close and something was touching his mouth. She blushed and said, "And by the way, I let you win," before skipping off to hug her mother. She looked back to a stunned, dazed Ichigo, giggled at the face he was making and waved. "Bye Ichigo!" He was so shocked he could barely think but somehow he managed to wave back at her.

A minute later his mom walked up to him and he immediately told her the details of the fight. "I won, mom, I won!" She smiled real big and said, "See? I knew you could do it!"

"Hey mommy?"

"Yes?"

"She said she let me win."

"Well _did_ she let you win?"

"I dunno. Maybe… You know what else she did?"

"What?"

"She- I think… she KISSED me!!"

Misaki looked down at her son in disbelief. "No way!" she exclaimed.

"Yeah, I think she did…" He was quiet for a minute before he said in a matter of a fact tone, "Mommy, I think Tatsuki's weird."

Misaki giggled and instinctively reached for her son's hand as they got ready to cross a busy street.

# # # # # # # # # # # # # # # #

A/N: Ok, peoples, I hope you liked it. This is my first oneshot and I think I did ok. Ummm, I got the idea for this when I was just laying on my bed watching my sister read another one of my fanfics and I decided to write it down. I kinda just wrote it all in one sitting. Anyway, I hope ya liked it and thanks for reading! (


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach or any of the characters

Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach or any of the characters. Tite Kubo simply will not surrender.

A/N: I wrote this is a sequel to 'Down at the Dojo' in response to a request from JamesRKS so thank him for half its existance.

I wasn't sure quite how to write it at first but as I thought about it, I figured it could be sorta like a collection of drabbles or something, so I decided just to take little bits and pieces as they grew up and here it is! Hope ya like it and thanks for reading.

This thing has been sitting around on my desktop for AGES! I wrote it and revised it in about three days and then didn't upload it because I don't know exactly how to end it. There will be another part I swear!!

)()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()(

She was staring at him. Again. What was with this girl? Here he was, just doing his lesson and Tatsuki kept glancing at him from across the room. He shot her a half annoyed, half confused glare and she busied herself again with a slight blush and a small smile. Girls were so weird. Ichigo went back to his multiplication sheet only to be distracted minutes later by a feeling he knew very well. He glanced up but she seemed to still be working. How annoying. She could lie so well. Every time he told the teacher, she never believed him because of the girl's insane lying skills. It was infuriating!

The bell rang and the teacher dismissed them for recess. As the students walked down the hallway, single file, Ichigo peeked into one of the fifth grade classrooms. He didn't think they looked too big anymore, but he still couldn't believe he was going to be in there the next year.

"Why do you keep doing that?" Ichigo found Tatsuki sitting on top of the jungle gym.

"Doing what?" she asked, looking down at him.

"Staring at me!" he yelled.

"Staring? What staring? I don't stare," she said.

"Yes you do." He knew what she was doing. She was being deliberately annoying just to tick him off.

"No I don't." She had such a straight face on. If he hadn't known any better, he would have believed her.

"Why are you lying?" Ichigo demanded.

"What lying? I don't lie."

"Yes you do!" he insisted.

"When?" She acted like she honestly didn't know what he was talking about.

"Right now!!" Well it worked. He was now officially ticked off.

"I don't know what you're talking about," she answered, now becoming the teeniest bit snippy.

"Yes you do!"

"No I don't," she said again in her slightly curt manner.

Ichigo growled and stomped off. Why did she like to do that to him? She would stare at him all day then act like she had no clue what he could be talking about. Boy, was she good at making him upset. He just figured she must have thought it was really funny. After about half an hour the bell rang and the teacher called all her students back inside. Ichigo was not happy.

OoOoOoOoOoOo

"Ok, now pick a partner," the teacher instructed. "We're going to do a science project. Tatsuki rolled her eyes. She hated science. It was so boring. Why'd she have to know how volcanoes worked anyway? It wasn't like she was ever gonna go near one. "Now, what you're going to do…" She tuned the rest of it out and just watched. She could get the rest of the information from her partner. Ami was a good listener.

Ichigo sat in the back of the room with the new kid, Mizuiro.

"So why do you sit in the back of the room?" he asked.

"Well one, it's my assigned seat, and two, because of her," Ichigo answered, pointing to Tatsuki.

"What do you mean?"

"Oh, she just likes to annoy me, that's all. We're friends I guess, but she still gets annoying.

"Oh." By the end of class the boys were almost done with their project. Mizuiro was a fast worker. Ichigo did help a lot, but Mizuiro had still done more work than him.

After that was recess just like every day. The boys had gone off to the jungle gym, while Tatsuki went to find some girls to play with. After a few minutes Ichigo and Mizuiro decided they were bored and started up a game of tag with a few of the other kids. About fifteen minutes of that and they decided they were tired and went back to sit down.

"Hey, why's she starin' at you like that?" Mizuiro asked, looking in Tatsuki's direction.

"Either because she's crazy, she's trying to annoy me, or she's thinking up some evil plan to torture somebody with. Probably me…" Ichigo answered.

OoOoOoOoOo

"Hey, you gonna eat that?" Tatsuki pointed at his cookie.

"Uh, yeah. It's like the best kind of cookie there is! I wouldn't have gotten it if I wasn't gonna eat it. Are you gonna eat yours?" Ichigo answered.

"Why would I ask for yours if I wasn't gonna eat mine?" she asked.

"Oh, I dunno, because you're crazy?"

"No I'm not!"

Yes you are. Ever since you were four you've been partially insane," he said.

"Hey! Be nice," she said elbowing him gently.

He smiled, amused and took a sip of water. He didn't know why but he had the urge to tease her today. At this point it was hard to tell which of the two was taller. In elementary school he'd always been shorter than her, but not by much. Now, it seemed, he was finally catching up.

"Besides," she added, "that just means that you not only got beaten by a girl, but a partially insane girl."

"Hey, that's not my fault. Besides, I bet I could beat you now. I've gotten better."

"So have I," she replied with a little smirk.

XxX

Ok, so here he was at the dojo. He couldn't believe he'd actually made that bet with her. It'd been a rhetorical statement! He didn't mean it! Ichigo looked around the room and saw Tatsuki stretching. Not many people were there and it obviously wasn't class time. She looked up and smiled upon noticing that he'd arrived.

"Ok, so the rules are clear, right?" Tatsuki asked as they finished stretching. "No hitting below the belt or above the collarbone. Everything else is legal."

Ichigo nodded, "Right."

They bowed and the sparring began. She had a good stance. Legs loose, but firm, feet light and ready to move, arms protecting the torso and hands protecting the face, but ready to punch at any moment.

He speculated for a brief second and threw a kick at what looked like a weak point. Too slow. She dodged and punched him solidly in the ribs. Not pausing to think about the pain she'd just inflicted, Ichigo swung his left fist and ended up punching her arm. About a minute later it was over. Somehow she'd gotten him to fall for one of the simplest of moves. She'd wedged her right foot behind his left and kicked it out from under him while forcibly hitting him in the chest with her palm. As a result, he now lay on his back defeated. Again. He sat up.

"Looks like I beat you again," she said with a certain air of smugness.

"Yeah, well I was going easy on you!" he said indignantly.

She smiled and said, "So was I."

Positively growling, Ichigo shouted, "I demand a rematch! This time don't hold back!"

"I won't if you won't," was her reply.

He scowled. "Ichigo, don't let anger fuel you. You always fight better when you have a clear head and no dominating emotion. Anger especially is bad when sparring."

"I know, I know…" he said. He took a deep breath, cleansing out the irritation. "Ok, so rematch?"

"I'm ready when you are."

Less than five minutes later he was on the ground again. "Fine, I get it! You're better than me!" he said.

She smiled. "Sorry, but I had to show you. Now fork it over."

"What?"

"The money," she said. "This _was_ a bet."

He scowled. "Here," he said as he handed it to her.

"Don't forget to bring the rest of it tomorrow," she said.

"What?"

"I won twice. You bet you could beat me, but you lost. Twice. So it was a double bet."

"No, it wasn't. We only bet on one fight. The first one was a warm-up since we weren't really trying. It was only a single bet."

"Fine, you give me your cookie tomorrow and we call it even."

"Only if you give me your soda," he bargained.

"Fair enough," Tatsuki shrugged.

OoOoOoOoOoOoOo

"Hey, who's the new kid?"

"I dunno but he's in my first hour class. I think his name's Ishida."

"Dude, he likes to sew. He's in the crafts club."

"Do you think he's gay?"

"I dunno, but I saw his schedule. He's in a lot of the really high classes."

"Oh, great. Another nerd. That's just what we need."

Gossip was circulating around the seventh grade class faster than usual. It wasn't every day they got a new student. Ichigo thought he looked like the biggest nerd he's ever seen. Tatsuki thought he looked really nice but really quiet. More than quiet. Aloof.

It'd been a few days and he'd still barely spoken a word. He hadn't made any attempts at becoming friends with anyone and, though he must have known about the whispers flitting through the halls, he did nothing to stop them. Obviously he didn't care about this place or where he fit in with these students. He spoke when spoken to, even then only barely, did his lessons and left, keeping entirely, almost firmly, to himself.

The student body had never come across such a loner and, after about a week, started to ignore him. It was obvious he didn't care though. In fact, it seemed that the less attention they gave to him the more comfortable he became.

"Hey Ichigo, look," Tatsuki said.

Ichigo followed her gaze. At the end of it he found that weird Ishida kid at a table by himself, reading a book. By the looks of it, he was too obsorbed in the land of words to even eat.

"Wanna go say hi?" she asked.

"What!? Are you crazy? No, I don't wanna go say hi!"

"Why not?"

"Because one, he's a complete weirdo, two, we would look like weirdos, and three, do you really think he'd talk to us?"

"Yes, I think he'll talk to us. Besides that, you already are a weirdo. What'll it hurt if you look like one?"

"Oh, shut up."

"C'mon, let's go."

"No, I'm not going."

"Fine, you stay here then," Tatsuki said. Her tone quite clearly stated that the conversation was over. She got up and walked away before he could argue any more. Rolling his eyes, Ichigo got up to follow her.

"Hi," Tatsuki said as she sat down. Across the table Ishida looked at her over his book. "I'm Tatsuki Arakawa-" just then Ichigo sat down next to her. "-and this is my friend, Ichigo Kurosaki." As she finished, Tatsuki gave a comfortable little smile. Ichigo just sat there, keeping out of it.

"Uryu Ishida," the bespectacled boy said distantly.

"You know, if you read any more you might starve," Tatsuki said glancing over at the nearly undisturbed lunch. Only the cookie had been eaten.

"So I see you like cookies," Ichigo attempted.

"Yes."

"Don't mind him. He has this weird obsession with cookies. I dunno why. He's just weird. So watcha readin'?"

"Sci-Fi."

"What book?" He held up the cover for her to read the title. "Oh, that one's pretty good! What's you think of the second book? I thought the ending was georgeos."

Uryu lowered the book to speak. "I think te ending was overdone and pretty clichéd but overall enjoyable. The middle was ok, but it skimmed over parts that should have been written out in detail. All in all, it wasn't very well written but I liked the plot so I liked it a lot anyway. My favorite would have to be the third one though. Or the first. I can't decide."

As they went into the details of the series, Ichigo got more and more confused. He had no idea what they were talking about and from what it sounded like, he didn't want to. More than that, he couldn't believe that Tatsuki had finally gotten him to talk! It was amazing and somehow strange. Very strange. How could a guy go for nearly two weeks without talking and then have a full-fledged fandom chatter? Those two didn't stop talking all day! Even though Tatsuki had finally gotten him to stop acting like a weirdo, he was still a nerd. He wasn't intending to be his friend for a while yet…

OoOoOoOoOo

"Hey Ichigo!" He stopped and turned around to see Tatsuki running towards him full speed.

"Yeah?" he asked as she came to a stop.

"You wanna go to the fireworks with me?"

He hesitated. That'd always been a social time in his family. Nobody had ever asked to skip it before. He'd have to talk it over with his dad first. Raising his hand to rub the back of his head, he said, "Well I'll have to ask my dad and see what he says, but sure."

Tatsuki positively beamed as she thanked him and ran off again before he could say another word.

XxX

"Hey Dad? Tatsuki asked me if I could go to the fireworks with her and I need to give her an answer soon. So can can I go?"

"What is this? My only son wants to abandon me, his father and his two little sisters on a traditional family outing for a girl? What is this world coming to?? Has my son fallen in love at such an early age?" He ran over to Karin and began hugging her, which turned out to be more like crushing to her. "Karin, my sweet daughter, look now at your brother and remember the sight," he cried. "The sight of a young boy abandoning his family for young lo- Oof!"

Isshin now had a shoeprint on his side and an expression of both physical and emotional pain etched into his face. "The only one in love here is you, with your melodrama! Geez, you're worse than Keigo Asano!"

Ichigo sniggered. Karin had only met Keigo once and she still hadn't let it go. Isshin ran heavily to the wall that held the oversized poster of his wife.

"Oh Masaki, my beautiful wife, when did our children become so cruel??" he sobbed as he sank to the floor, trailing huge stripes of tears down the poster.

Ichigo rolled his eyes, "So can I go or not?"

"Well if you insist on breaking your father's heart-"

"Thanks Dad!" Ichigo said as he dashed up the stairs leaving Issin in his own little rain cloud on the floor.

XxX

-BOOM-

The entire sky was now filled with exploding lights, the ground trembled at the noise and something in his head clicked. He was… They were… She…? Kissing? They? Him? Her?! Ichigo opened his eyes and broke away quickly, half horrified, half excited, but most of all shocked. That had been his first real kiss. Well other than that time he was four but he didn't really think that counted.

Turning his head he saw Tatsuki, his best friend, the girl he'd known almost literally since diapers, the one that ticked him off just for the heck of it. She was smiling and watching the sky, not paying any attention to him. Great, was she going to pretend that never happened too? No, she'd stopped doing that a couple years ago, though he noticed that she still thought it was funny.

What had happened? He still didn't really know. They were just sitting there yelling something about fireworks and then all of a sudden he kissed her. Wait? _He_ kissed her? Was that right? He couldn't remember… Suddenly he felt the urge to speak, but after a moment of hesitation, realized he didn't have anything to say, so just kept quiet. It didn't matter anyway. Actions spoke louder than words and, boy did that one have a lot to say…

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

"Hey Ichigo, I think Ishida-kun likes Orihime-chan," Tatsuki said.

"What? Well of course he does. Everybody does…" Ichigo replied.

"That's not what I mean. He's nice to her."

"Isn't everybody nice to her?"

Tatsuki sighed, rolling her eyes. "You're hopeless… Hey you gonna eat that?"

"You know I am. Have you ever known me not to eat a cookie?"

"You know, I'm beginning to think you have a problem. What is it with you and cookies?"

"What are you talking about?" Ichigo asked defiantly. "They're like the best things on the planet!"

"So you're going to the dance tonight right?"

"Yeah, why?" Ichigo asked.

"Just wondering. I wonder if this one'll be any better than the last one. It was kinda boring last time."

"Yeah, I know."

XxX

So here he was. Back at school but this time, for fun. Luckily he didn't have to look very hard before he found his friends. Keigo, Mizuiro and Tatsuki were hanging aroung by the soda machines as usual. Keigo was chattering away but otherwise calm at the moment. Mizuiro was enduring the constant stream of chatter and Tatsuki was talking to her friend, Ami.

"Hey guys," he said as he walked over to them.

"Hey, what's up?"

"Not much…" Ichigo said as he checked his watch. It read a little after seven o'clock. "Well the dance should start any minute now…" he commented.

After a while the pleasant evening collapsed into raucous night. Ichigo stood, watching the excitement thinking it was like every other dance. Finally, the authorities thought the students had had enough excitement and as a result played a slow song to ease the tension. As the fast music elapsed, Tatsuki, hair frizzy from dancing, hopped up to him.

"Wanna dance?"

"What?!"

"Dance" she said motioning to a room full of couples.

"I, uh-" What the hell was she thinking? They were best friends! Or at least that's how he saw her. Besides, weren't the guys supposed to ask the girls to dance? Then again, Tatsuki had always been a bit of a tomboy. "Sure…" he said uncertainly.

"Cool," she answered putting her hands on Ichigo's shoulders.

After a second he said, "This is weird."

"Why?"

"Because… I dunno, it just is…" he answered.

"But why?" she asked again.

"Because… You're my best friend!"

"Yeah? So we're dancing as friends." Ichigo shook his head at the floor disbeleivingly. "What?" she asked defensively.

"You are so weird," he said almost incredulously.

"Gee thanks," she answered sarcastically.

"Any time," he teased.

XxX

"So what? Now we're kissing as friends too?" Ichigo asked as they broke apart.

"Tatsuki laughed. "Sure, why not?"

"Well I hate to break it to you but friends don't do that," he joked.

Keigo had been dancing like a maniac all night. Ichigo couldn't understand how he could still be talking so animatedly. He could only guess he'd had more than one energy drink.

"Hey you guys! What's up? You bored? I'm not, this is fun. How come you don't dance? Dancing's fun. What's the point of coming to a dance if you're just gonna stand around? Huh huh huh? What were you sayin'? Hi!" He said this so fast it sounded almost like one word.

"Ok, dude, you really need to calm down" Tatsui said.

"Either that or go bug somebody else" Ichigo added.

"Ok, whatever. See ya later. Bye!" he said before bounding off into the crowd.

"Wow. He really just needs to cool it" Tatsuki said.

"Hey, as long as he doesn't try to kill anybody, it's ok," Ichigo replied.

OoOoOoOoOo

It'd been a few weeks and he still had trouble beleiving it. How could he and Tatsuki be a couple? It was just so weird. What could have posessed him to ask her out anyway? Since when did he like her? Sure, they'd been best friends since forever but that was just friends right? Did he even like her? He wasn't so sure.

)()()()()()()()()()()()()()(

A/N: Yeah, I know it skips around a lot and especially towards the end I felt like it started to fall apart a little bit, but meh, I wrote it in only a few days so I'm not gonna feel too bad about it. I think I'm going to just stop it here for now and add to it later. I have no idea how to end it!


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